One or two spaces after a period?

[gaidensensei]

I'm curious about this. I seen some people who still use two spaces after a period. As a kid, I always remember being told "two spaces after a period".
I used to do this until around a few years ago I caught myself asking "why is spacing twice needed?" and went to one space.



Old thread revived with no useful additional input.
admin allisolm

 

[insect9]

I just use one.

 

[dpodblood]

One.

 

[xanis]

One. The only person I know that used two spaces was my dad, and he stopped doing it years ago.

 

[OOBradm]

What a silly question. The correct answer is one.

EDIT:
I intentionally tried to leave 2 spaces between those sentences, and the forums truncated it to just have one space. *mindblown*

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

One. Oh, God, PLEASE only put one.

A theory as to having two spaces after a period is that with monospaced fonts (which is what typewriters used) double-spacing after full stops made it easier for the reader to discern the end of sentences. Of course, since we don't really use monospacing anymore, this is kind of useless. And it looks horrible even with monospaced fonts.

 

[EvilYoda]

Mr. Pendatic's got it right - two spaces originating with typographers. Currently, you can refer to MLA or Chicago-style and they both use one space after a period.

 

[surfsatwerk]

One space after a period leads to sodomy. The grammar lords had one chance to teach me and I'm not going back to "learning" just because they want to change their minds now.

 

[duragezic]

One dangit. I hate that two spaces crap. I remember in college working with a group and parts of the report having two spaces (that they wrote) and others with one (that I wrote).

I had heard long ago that two spaces is not necessary since pretty much every font used is proportional and not a fixed width like Courier. Two spaces was used on typewriters but I don't know why people my age use two spaces cause I'm pretty sure very few of them used a typewriter.

 

[Jaepheth]

One space for pretty much every scenario

the exception seems to be IF you're using a mono-spaced font.

 

[Numenorean]

Two. It's the only correct way.

 

[zinfamous]

One.

end thread after first response.

Unless you are still using a typewriter built c. 1927.

You aren't, are you?

 

[surfsatwerk]

One.

end thread after first response.

Unless you are still using a typewriter built c. 1927.

You aren't, are you?

The adapter cable would make you pee yourself in terror.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

I worked with someone who used two spaces after a period, and it made it extremely difficult to proof-read and make corrections on her papers, as you have to go through the entire thing and check for spacing consistency. There's no need for two spaces after a period; if you can't figure out where a sentence ends, that's your problem, not mine.

 

[etrigan420]

2. Always have and always will.

Now get off of my fucking lawn.

 

[Jaepheth]

I worked with someone who used two spaces after a period, and it made it extremely difficult to proof-read and make corrections on her papers, as you have to go through the entire thing and check for spacing consistency. There's no need for two spaces after a period; if you can't figure out where a sentence ends, that's your problem, not mine.

Edit -> Replace (Ctrl + H)

Find: ".  "

Replace with: ". "

Replace All

 

[Numenorean]

I worked with someone who used one space after a period, and it made it extremely difficult to proof-read and make corrections on her papers, as everything looks needlessly shoved together. There's no need for just one space after a period; if you can't figure out why you need to leave enough space, that's your problem, not mine.

 

[zinfamous]

2. Always have and always will.

Now get off of my fucking lawn.

Your High school English teachers failed you.

:\

 

[Mike Gayner]

God I fucking hate it when people use 2.

 

[AstroManLuca]

I worked with someone who used two spaces after a period, and it made it extremely difficult to proof-read and make corrections on her papers, as you have to go through the entire thing and check for spacing consistency. There's no need for two spaces after a period; if you can't figure out where a sentence ends, that's your problem, not mine.

Search and replace. One of the first things I do when I get a paper (I am a proofreader).

There are much more annoying things people do in Word, like using spaces to indent stuff or making a "table" using spaces instead of the built-in table function, but two spaces after a period is more common.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Edit -> Replace (Ctrl + H)

Find: ". "

Replace with: ". "

Replace All

Ctrl + H doesn't work with a paper copy.

 

[Numenorean]

Your High school English teachers failed you.

:\

My high school English teachers required us to use two spaces after a period, because that's how it's done.

 

[AstroManLuca]

I worked with someone who used one space after a period, and it made it extremely difficult to proof-read and make corrections on her papers, as everything looks needlessly shoved together. There's no need for just one space after a period; if you can't figure out why you need to leave enough space, that's your problem, not mine.

You are objectively wrong.

 

[Numenorean]

You are objectively wrong.

I'm correct.

 

[Jaepheth]

Ctrl + H doesn't work with a paper copy.

That's when you use Ctrl + Intern.